


From Wood to Steel

by eminorseven



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Because that's what they deserve, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Humor, Light Angst, Philosophical conversations with TS and Brian, but its friendship flavored, mostly just them being friends, the Mechanisms causing chaos in the background, while these two are having an existential crisis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:34:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26191258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eminorseven/pseuds/eminorseven
Summary: Drumbot Brian and the Toy Soldier have regular tea parties to talk about the intricacies of being not exactly organic. This is the origin story of this particular tradition, of how they became friends.
Relationships: Drumbot Brian & The Toy Soldier
Comments: 7
Kudos: 52





	From Wood to Steel

**Author's Note:**

> Drumbot Brian and the Toy Soldier have regular tea parties to talk about the intricacies of being not exactly organic. This is the origin story of this particular tradition.
> 
> (TW: existentialism and discussions of what's real or not, especially in the first bit which is about organs, Brian panicking once in a while but nothing too detailed)

# I The Intricacies of Having Inorganic Organs, or the Lack Thereof

Drumbot Brian sat down with a soft _clang_. 

It had been decades upon centuries upon millennia and he was still unused to the sensation. Or apparent lack thereof. The soft beanbag (covered in some unidentifiable dried liquid) had given way to his weight and he felt himself sinking straight down all the way to the floor, splitting the pellets. 

The Toy Soldier had laid out a rather extravagant tea party. There were cookies, scones and little neatly cut mini sandwiches all arranged in what his cybernetic brain computed as a perfect circle. He wasn’t about to touch them, he’d learned his lesson along with the rest of the crew about the wooden man’s cooking, but a quick scan of the table revealed a discarded box. These would probably be fine to have. Probably.

Brian was never really sure of how it drank. It always pours itself a cup around teatime on standard ship time, and sips it with it’s little pinky up. There was always some form of gentle slurping, but he never knew where it came from. He cleared his throat. It was more akin to a soft reverb of metal against metal and Brian was once again reminded, for the umpteenth time, that he was made of inorganic material.

The Toy Soldier’s head snaps up, too smooth and too fast. “Oh, I am sorry, old bean! I must have gotten carried away setting up, I did not notice that you had made it!”

“That’s alright, I can be very quiet when I want to be.” It’s voice was painfully human, Brian mused to himself. At least in comparison to his uncanny approximation of what was a human voice. It was always tinged with a faint robotic whine in the background.

“I am glad you made it to today’s tea party! No one has accepted in a while.” While it’s painted smile and permanently fixed expression showed a general air of cheeriness, Brian noted that there was a little drop in the buoyancy of its voice. 

Brian considered his response carefully. He had definitely been guilty of declining in the past, not out of any ill feeling, but timing. “Well, I’m happy to spend time with you.” 

The Toy Soldier was already quite rigid in posture, but seemed to straighten up, its face brightening ever so slightly. As much as a wooden face would allow for. “Shall we get started? Would you like me to pour you a cup of tea?”

“Thank you, I would like that.”

“TS... I’m not sure how to ask this question, but I’d like to know because it can pertain to me as well.” It looked at him, cocking its head in a quizzical fashion. Brian was suddenly very conscious of what he was doing with his hands. “Er… How do you drink?”

The Toy Soldier returned its head to its normal position and narrowed its eyes in thought. It stood stock still. Brian’s eyes flickered around the room, desperately looking for a possible escape in the advent of an awkward silence.

“That’s a very interesting question! I suppose I pretend to!” It picked up the teacup with mechanical accuracy, with its characteristic pinky finger lifted up. Brian once again heard the apparent sound of drinking, but still couldn’t puzzle out how it happened.

“Do you know where it goes?”

“I am not entirely sure!” The Toy Soldier paused for exactly three seconds. “Do you know how you drink?”

Brian took a moment to think as well, curiously finding himself counting another three seconds. “I guess it has to go somewhere.” He picks up his own teacup and stares at the piping hot leaf water inside. Shouldn’t he, Brian cringes at the thought of frying his circuitry again (he’s not about to come to Nastya in such a short amount of time since the last accident), _not_ drink? Should he be capable of drinking at all? Brian looks down at his stomach and impulsively pokes it. Another _clang_ echoes throughout the room. 

Brian freezes, and remembers that he is not alone.

The Toy Soldier looks at him expectantly, teacup delicately balanced on tea saucer.

Brian begins to panic.

“Do I have organs?” The cookie pile was looking more appetizing by the minute. Perhaps he could get out of this by dying. Wait. How exactly does he die… when he might have no organs?

“I do not know! Do you?”

“I don’t know either!”

“That’s a shame, I thought you would have an answer!” 

He could feel the wiring in his brain sparking. “Why would I ask then!” 

“That is a very good point, Drumbot!” Brian paused to collect himself. He breathed in, then out, slowly. As he did, what he vaguely remembered to be the sensation of ventilation. Okay, so maybe he has lungs. That’s a relief.

“I appear to have some kind of breathing apparatus.” The Toy Soldier finished its cup and laid it back on the table with a gentle _thunk._ It then held up a hand to its chin in a thinking position. This time it really seemed to be on the verge of a discovery, as it perked up with its index finger pointed. 

“I don’t think I have lungs. Or at least proper ones!”

“That’s very interesting considering how you can sing. Very well might I add!” The Toy Soldier’s smile seems to widen at that and Brian softly creaks out a wry grin in response. “I know that I have at least one real organ.” He gestures awkwardly towards where his heart is, beating steadily behind the glass panel that he has to confront every time maintenance day rolls around.

“What do you think makes an organ real? Or anything real!” 

Brian paused, leaning back in his chair, steepling his fingers. They made a faint _clunk_ noise when put together. “In some ways an organ would be real if it was made out of real flesh and blood.”

The Toy Soldier looked up as if thinking. “But what about us?” 

“Perhaps, we aren’t real in the normal sense.”

“I am not sure I understand that! I do not know if I feel real! So maybe my organs are not real either!”

Brian begins to chase imaginary mechanical rabbits around in his mind, thinking about the implications of that statement. He’s been down this hole before and stopped before he fell down any deeper. “That’s not necessarily true.”

A long pause settled between the two. The Toy Soldier’s face, ever unchanging, looked straight at Brian’s and he uncomfortably shifted in his bean bag.

“O-oh, I don’t mean to be presumptuous about your experience, Toy Soldier, but I think you’re very real. But it’s slightly different for us. We’re real in the same way that the Aurora is real, which doesn’t make us, _not_ real but-”

“Artificial!”

“Right. Artificial. Close enough to real, I suppose.”

Brian needed a cookie. Desperately. This conversation was taking a turn and he didn’t see a way out that didn’t involve leaving the room in a hurry to scream into a pillow.

“I think you are very real too, Drumbot.” He was halfway through reaching towards the cookie pile before retracting the arm sheepishly. It made a faint _whirr_ sound as he did. A burst of warmth emerged from within his heart. The last remaining part of his original body. He smiles at that.

“Thank you, Soldier. You’re right. I don’t think being artificial makes us any less real. We still have the same functions,” the Toy Soldier munched away happily on a sandwich before him, “and it’s not like we don’t have pieces of flesh and blood ourselves.”

“Quite right, you are!” It hummed in response.

They ate cookies and sandwiches in silence. The cookies definitely had no teeth in it, so Brian could confidently rate it five octokittens out of ten (he wasn’t quite sure how Ivy and Tim had devised that scale, nor how accurate he was in using it but it was certainly more useful than, say, stars). It wasn’t as awkward as Brian thought it would be, in fact, it was rather pleasant after they wrapped up the tension early on. Every time he finished his cup the Toy Soldier would automatically fill it up, and he would pass a plate or drop a spoonful of sugar in its cup every time it asked. Soon the food on the table had been cleared out and the teapot was mostly empty. All of it _had_ to go somewhere, Brian thought to himself. Maybe it was okay that he just wouldn’t know. 

They chatted about inane things, whatever they had gotten up to that morning- the Toy Soldier had apparently been shot out of the airlock again by none other than Jonny D’Ville himself (Brian guessed this) and decided that perhaps a brisk spacewalk would be a good way to spend its free time before returning to the ship. Brian never got an answer for how exactly it managed to do this every time, even without his help, since he would let it in on many an occasion after seeing it float through the void through the windshield. He felt a strange kinship with it on that front.

Brian had been in charge of brunch (again), and had been making large stacks of pancakes that kept disappearing every time he would turn around. He was under the assumption that Raphaella had yet to perfect the invisibility ray and that Marius was still out, never mind that the rest of the crew probably hadn’t gotten up yet, but with a perfunctory glance at a vent that wasn’t previously above the stove he figured that he’d purposefully leave an extra stack out for Nastya (and Jonny, if he happened to be hiding out in the vents with her).

While contemplating on the rest of the crew currently not present, Brian finished his last teacup. “I feel like a patchwork quilt of all of you.” He declares out loud.

The Toy Soldier cocked its head again. Brian felt inner amusement at its similarity to birds. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I mentioned my lungs. That’s something from Ashes. Then there’s my brain. Like Ivy’s. Eyes-” 

“-like Tim’s!” 

“You get the rest. Can’t say that we’ve had a mechanized tongue though. Aside from us, of course.”

The Toy Soldier bit into the cookie, its mouth snapping open and shut around it as it disappeared into its insides. It tilted its head up and approximated a swallowing sound. “That’s very compelling! I think I feel a bit like a quilt myself.”

“In what way, if I may ask?”

“I have had many uniforms! I have been a husband,” 

“Husband?” It slipped out from Brian’s mouth without thought, but the Toy Soldier kept going.

“-Rose Red, soldier for both the Moon Kaiser and the British Infantry, a nymph, not to mention all of the roles I play for our music!”

A startled squawk rings faintly in the distance, followed by the ship rattling violently with the force of an explosion. “Ah, I think Tim and Ashes are both up now. Hm. Well, what about your inner mechanisms?”

“Like I said, Drumbot, I do not know what is inside of me in the same way you do not!”

“Ah, it was worth a shot.” Brian considered how they could find out, bar going to either Nastya or Raphaella, or even Marius, he thought with a shudder. He thought about all he knew about being in tune with one's body, feeling real and present in the moment, and blurted out, “TS, let’s play a game. Could we be very quiet for a while, see if we can hear what’s going on inside us?”

“Oh, that sounds like an absolutely tip-top game, I shall play along!” The Toy Soldier sat up, eerily motionless. Brian followed suit, straightening his posture to the best of his ability on the uneven bean bag with stains on it, and closed his eyes.

A moment passes. Then several. And then a couple more- “I am so sorry, Drumbot, I do not want to interrupt the game, but was I supposed to be closing my eyes?”

Brian blinks. “Oh, you can if you want to.”

“Ah, okay!”

And there they sat still, listening to the _whirr_ of their clockwork put up against the backdrop of the Aurora’s shifts and the occasional gunshot.

# II What Happens to You In New New New Las Vegas Stays In New New New Las Vegas

The Toy Soldier jumped off the Aurora’s platform along with several of its friends. Nastya had been planning for some alone time with her lover and everyone had wanted _out_ , although it noticed that Marius and Brian had not gotten off yet. It landed gracefully as it had learned to from King Cole’s war, to the campaign against the Moon Kaiser and many more conflicts. It pretended not to feel the loud thud it made, making reverberations against its whole body and its internal mechanisms shudder.

The rest had made a similar landing, although it saw that Jonny had miscalculated mid-air and had slipped over the edge. 

“Can one of you fuckers lend me a hand?” He shouts, voice edged with panic. The Toy Soldier couldn’t just leave a friend in need! It thought about the best way to go about this, and decided that detaching its arm would be a good bet. It bent over the edge with a free arm to extend a grip for Jonny. 

A good bet, if it were not for the Aurora jerkily landing onto the building behind them and a sudden _whoosh_ of air tipping it over, losing its grip on the arm.

A shrill yelp was heard from the first mate as the Toy Soldier’s arm fell below the edge of the building, quickly followed by two metal arms, one red, one black. It turned around to see Brian walking down the ramp and Marius excitedly waving next to him, which prompted it to wave back with the same amount of enthusiasm. They were both similarly, less symmetrical than the Toy Soldier last remembered.

It was soon interrupted with a _clang, clang, thunk!_

Marius winced at all three sounds, shoulders increasingly inching towards his ears and jogged over. “You okay there?”

The Toy Soldier pretended to feel a faint throb on the back of its head. “I am alright, Doctor Baron von Raum!”

Over his face, an expression that the Toy Soldier could not easily figure out flickered through before settling on a reassuring smile. “Tell you what, TS, I’ll bring you back some uniforms and we can try them on later!”

“I would very much like that, thank you!” 

They salute at each other. Marius then takes a running leap and propels himself down the building with a whoop. The Toy Soldier watches him splat face first into a car. 

“I’m not Ivy, but I’m 80% sure that there was definitely a better way to go about that.” The Toy Soldier turns its head 45 degrees exactly, to look at Brian, who had strode out to watch the street below. 

“So. Before you get going, I wanted to thank you for the tea party the other day.” 

“The tea party! Yes, I remember. We talked about quilts!” 

“Yes, we did. It was very illuminating and I enjoyed it quite a lot.”

“Thank you for coming to it!"

The Toy Soldier stands near the edge of the building, and Brian sits down next to it. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot... and I thought maybe it’s what happens to us that makes us real. I mean, take a look at Marius- oh, where has he gone now.”

“He has regenerated! Look! Those street performers look very happy to be around him!” The Toy Soldier looked down. It turned to Brian. “Now they are all dead!” 

Brian stifles a laugh. “See, I think that Marius is very real and all the things that are happening to him, are real too. That sort of defines his existence in the same way for the rest of the crew. We feel real when we have real things happen to us.”

“Do you feel like you are here? Right now, I mean. At this moment.”

With a loud _fwomph_ the entire street below had burst into flame. Ah! There was Ashes! The Toy Soldier nodded in appreciation, and sat back more than a little bit to protect its uniform from being signed (it did not want a repeat of the last time it was set on fire and that time it was not even Ashes’ fault!), humming noncommittally. Brian also visibly shifted back.

“I can not say that I am _not_ here, so does that not mean that I am?”

Brian lets out a rusty laugh, smiling at the absurdity of the situation. “That sounds like a riddle.”

“Oh, I am sorry! I didn’t mean to confuse you, I just said what I felt!” The Toy Soldier pretended to feel a mixture of embarrassment bubble up from inside, which was a warm and uninviting feeling. It quashed the feeling down with all of its might and turned away from the metal man.

“That’s alright, Soldier, you don’t have to apologize. It made sense.” Brian was looking out into the distance, but had inched closer to pat the Toy Soldier on the shoulder. The contact between metal and wood was certainly a weird sensation! It made a strange sort of _clunk, clunk_. 

Brian stopped after two pats, and then hesitated for a moment, before experimentally patting again. This time it made a higher pitched sound. 

The Toy Soldier instantly caught on, and gently _thunked_ Brian on the shoulder as well. Then it made small karate chop motions down his arm. With each subsequent bit of contact it made different noises. 

Brian conjured a pair of drumsticks from a compartment (the Toy Soldier thought about perhaps asking Nastya to figure out if it could also have some of its own if it carved some bits out) and looked to the Toy Soldier’s eyes, asking for confirmation. It nodded, and they both started something akin to an elaborate slap fight that occasionally made intricate rhythms. Neither one of them sang but both were humming the lamentable story of Iphis.

When they finished, they stared at each other. 

Brian was visibly pursing his lips, which meant that the metal was grinding together. The Toy Soldier kept its composure, but was holding its breath (which prompted it to recall that, oh yes, it does not need to.)

Both burst into laughter.

“Well, that felt real!” If they had the capability to cry, they would be, and the Toy Soldier wipes a finger across its eye. Brian’s shoulders were heaving, and a loud creaking sound was emanating from his body.

“You are such an interesting fellow, Drumbot! I suppose that changes what we were talking about!”

“You’re right. I guess it doesn’t matter in the end, does it? As long as we’re in the moment.”

“I salute to that!”

The pair watched as a building about two blocks away exploded, with a generous showering of poker chips, torn playing cards and debris (the Toy Soldier could have sworn that Tim’s body also flew out with the rest but it was not entirely sure) shooting out.

Brian made an approximation of a snorting sound. “Oh, Tim’s definitely in the moment.”

“Would you care to join them, or are we going to continue this game up here?”

Brian looked down at the streets below. The door to the bank vault at the center of the planet was being melted down by Raphaella, while Jonny and Marius left a trail of bodies in their wake. Ivy seemed to have disappeared, likely having snuck into wherever they kept their electronic databases.

He sighed. 

“I think I’m okay.”

The Toy Soldier was just happy to be there, and was particularly happy to be spending time with Brian again. “Wilco!”

A stray pair of goggles flies up and lands pathetically at their feet. 

“Yoinking that.” Brian unfastens the back and places it on top of the goggles he already has on his hat. They watch the carnage unfold.

* * *

When the rest of the Mechanisms had gathered, trudging up the ramp as Brian did his usual headcount, Jonny muttered an apology, albeit reluctantly, to the Toy Soldier for the arm throwing. It patted him on the back, paused to wipe off the viscera, and gave him a little salute. “Captain!” He perked up at that, flashing the Toy Soldier with a confident, if not slightly wobbly, grin. 

It decided that if experiences were what made it real, then it was going to make the most of it by feeling good about them.

# III Feelings Are Irrelevant, That’s What The First Mate Said But We Don’t Listen To Him

And so life went about the Aurora for the next couple weeks.

Brian piloted the ship and ended up with almost all of the chores (again) but he didn’t entirely mind too much. It filled up most of the days with something to do. In his spare time he would sing softly to himself or practice some instruments (in order of Jonny hiding them, the drums, accordion, then banjo). Relative peace and quiet for him.

The Toy Soldier did whatever it usually did. It started off with organizing all of the ingredients in the fridge in alphabetical order, and then helping Tim with target practice, rescuing the prince of a planet system who was running away front the playing the mandolin, collecting stamps and teeth, rotating its limbs 360 degrees for Raphaella and some tea parties here and there. 

Both were musing on their conversations, but did not actively seek each other out until one day they both strode into the observation deck clutching maintenance supplies. 

Brian was holding a whole gallon of phosphoric acid and a bucket with tools and a toothbrush clattering around in it. The Toy Soldier had a neatly organized toolbox of paints, with brushes of various sizes sticking out of it. It also had a bucket but it was precariously perched on top of its head.

“Hallo there, old chap!”

“Hello. We haven’t seen each other in a while, have we? New New New Las Vegas was it?”

“No, we have not! Are you going to be using the deck? I can move if you would like!”

Brian shook his head. “No, TS, you can stay here. We can do maintenance together if you’d like.”

The Toy Soldier considered this. Brian was a very good conversation partner and it had fun when they were together. “If that is alright with you!”

Brian smiled gently, before wincing at the sound of rusty hinges squeak. The Toy Soldier politely pretended not to hear. 

“As you can probably hear,” the Toy Soldier shook its head, “I am getting a little rusty. Literally. Not entirely sure why I thought landing straight into a water planet was a good idea, but Ashes was very convincing.”

“And my paints are chipping!” It tapped at its eyebrow and a little flap of paint dangerously fluttered out. A moment passes, and the whole eyebrow decides that it’s the end, and falls onto the floor with a clatter. “See!”

“Let’s get to work then.” The Toy Soldier saluted, knocking the bucket off its head.

They worked in comfortable silence again, methodically going about the usual rounds. It was certainly troublesome that he had company for once. The luxury of being able to do ridiculous poses to reach some spots was lost, although the Toy Soldier seemed to not mind at all, bending in all sorts of 15 degree increments to get at its legs under the rolled up trousers. Brian scrubbed at the joints between his fingers first, then his arms and knees. He squeezed a bit of grease to loosen them. The Toy Soldier was applying a base coat to its arms and face and was failing to conceal its constant glances at the bottle. (“Do you want some?” “Oh yes! Thank you very much for asking, Drumbot! I was afraid that I would be bothering you and did not want to interrupt your cleaning!”) 

Brian eventually made it through the rest of his body and reached to get the back of his head when a gear or piston hitched in his arm. 

“Oh dear.” He tried the motion again, but the hinge had completely given up on him and, wow, he was stuck. “Do you mind reaching this spot at the base of my neck?” He craned his head uncomfortably to let the Toy Soldier see.

“I can do that for you! Would you like me to fix your arm as well?” 

“I’m not sure either one of us would do a good job of it, and I need this for later, I’ve promised the crew cupcakes and between Marius and me, it would be good to have at least 3 metal hands.” Brian shook at the idea of having to go to Nastya again for the second time this month. Perhaps the pancakes would act as a sort of olive branch for the favor, and as an apology for walking in that last time. It was not his fault that he broke down occasionally, and he certainly did not deserve a Its hand briefly ghosted over the switch. 

The Toy Soldier paused in its action. The request was not strong enough to be an order so it did not need to carry it out completely if it did not want to. It had been pretending to avoid this topic for a while. Surely it was alright if it was helping a friend!

“Drumbot Brian,” the unfamiliarity of the first name was palpable, “how do you feel about your switch?”

Brian hesitated. He was on Means Justify the Ends mode. He could justify not telling the wooden man for his own gains but after the tea party and the conversation at the top of the building in New New New Las Vegas he felt like he had to divulge something. The Toy Soldier had retracted its hand and scooched over to his side, sitting on its legs, waiting.

“I-I don’t know how to feel about it.” His servers were running wild and he felt the fan inside his arm whizz to life to cool down the processors. “I don’t have the freedom to feel things the way I want anymore. Both settings are limited in what I can do. Feeling things, that’s what makes you real. Not just organs or experiences or whatever.”

“But you feel things! Surely that means you are real then, Drumbot.”

“That’s not, that’s not how it works-”

“I am confused! You are having an emotional reaction, is that not feeling things?”

“How am I supposed to feel when I can’t control it!” The Toy Soldier’s eyes widened by a several centimeters and its mouth snapped shut with a _clack!_

Brian instantly regretted his tone, he didn’t like shouting, especially towards a friend, and now his stupid mechanical brain was somehow letting him feel frustration and guilt when those things are useless and-

“Would you like a hug? I heard that it makes you feel better.” The Toy Soldier asked, cheer somewhat subdued.

Brian was as close to the verge of tears if his body was actually capable of that response. “Yes. Yes, I would like that.” He whispered.

The Toy Soldier automatically lifted up its arms and enveloped Brian in a hug from the side. It would have been a highly uncomfortable position, with Brian’s body pointed in a different direction from his head and the Toy Soldier in a halfway kneeling position, if it were not for their mechanical bodies. Brian crumpled in its arms instantly. Literally. “Wow, oof, TS, do you mind easing up slightly-”

“Oh oops! So sorry, friend!” It shifted its grip and they sat. Holding each other. It was silent on the deck. Both could hear the steady ticking of their inner mechanisms, which brought a strange lull over the atmosphere. Sensations came differently when one was made of wood or metal.

Brian decides to break the silence. “This always feels rather strange. I only really vaguely remember how it feels to, _feel_ things. It’s like there’s a thick glass surrounding me, muffling everything.” 

The Toy Soldier pretended to sniff in a contemplatory way, although it came out a little more like a whistle of air being sucked in between wood flooring. “I can’t say that I’ve ever really felt things then!”

“What do you mean?”

“Everything feels muffled. I just pretend to have feelings and sensations. I do not think that it’s the same thing.” Brian heard the same drop in its voice from the first tea party. He tugged himself from its grasp, and felt a pang of empathy. “I don’t think that’s true. N-not to be presumptuous again.” 

The Toy Soldier cocked its head in its characteristic way. Brian noticed that the lack of eyebrow really changed its expression and that there had been all these minute changes that he had been picking up on this entire time.

He changed the wording. “How strongly do you feel?”

“I don’t think I understand!”

“Like, say, you get a new uniform. Like when Marius got back from the casino planet and both of you did a, frankly, very elaborate fashion showcase for us.”

“Ah, that was absolutely spiffing! I definitely pretended to feel extremely happy! The uniforms the Doctor Baron got for us were stunning! Oh the spikes!”

“And that was really strong, right?”

“I suppose you’re right! Yes, it was rather strong!”

Its expression remained unchanging but it tilted its head down, actually looking vaguely downcast. “I was really just happy to be involved.”

“That’s all you need. You actually felt that. You are free to feel things. I think that’s very real.”

“Hm! The captain tells me-” 

“First mate.” Brian felt a small surge of glee at that despite neither Jonny or Tim being around to witness it.

“-first mate, does say that feelings are irrelevant! Mostly when talking to the Baron Doctor von Raum!” 

Brian stifled laugh bubbles up at that. “That’s probably because of the psychoanalysis, Soldier. But we _don’t_ listen to Jonny.”

“That’s true! We do _not_ listen to Jonny!”

“I think it’s okay to feel things. And, I guess, both of us do feel, and that makes us quite real.”

“Now let me finish up for you, I want to repay the favor. My hands aren’t as steady as Ashes or Jonny but I can try my best.”

“Thank you very much, Drumbot!” It saluted again, bouncing back quickly, and the Toy Soldier took care to stay as still as possible the whole time. 

Brian did an okay job. The moustache was slightly wobblier but the Toy Soldier brushed it off as them having matching hair types (“I don’t really know where my hair comes from.” “Me neither!”) and the eyebrow was glued back on a couple degrees off from where it used to be. They chatted all throughout, discussing the merits of the octokitten rating system (the Toy Soldier was apparently a big fan of it) and the upcoming cupcake night (Brian was set on getting the frosting done last because last time there was a variety of gunpowder related accidents). He finishes the last layer of varnish on the Toy Soldier’s face and removes one of his arms, fiddling with a couple of buttons at the base of it. A faint _vrr_ noise pours out of it as he twists the hand off and a little fan blows air at the Toy Soldier’s face. It tries very hard not to blink before it remembers that it, in fact, does not need to.

“That should do it.”

“Thank you very much! You are a good friend.”

“You too, TS.”

They pack up, sealing the appropriate lids and checking the floor for any stray liquids to clean up (really it was more of a lazy scan than anything else), and headed off to their quarters. The two would not see each other again until dinner time (which, on the Aurora, is very much a late night affair), when they bumped into each other on the way to the aptly named mess hall.

Brian was muttering to himself. “I hope that Raphaella reconstituted the chocolate properly, _without_ poison this time, thank you very much Miss La Cognizi.”

“She just asked me very strongly to keep it a secret!” A voice pops in from behind him and Brian would have jumped several feet in the air if it were not for the stupid jets installed in his feet. Asking Tim to help with that was a mistake, for he fell asleep halfway through (now how did that happen, he wondered) and woke up with upgraded rockets attached that he could not figure out how to remove. 

The Toy Soldier had both of its index fingers pointed at each other, looking innocent. Brian sighed, a long suffering sigh. “At least you’re being honest. Care to join us for cupcake night?”

“Oh certainly! I have brought my own ingredients.”

“Is it teeth again?”

The Toy Soldier just smiled at him, and started marching towards the room at great speed. Brian shook his head, and followed suit. It burst through the door. “Hello friends! We have just concluded that we are very real!”

Jonny narrows his eyes at it. “The fuck does that mean.” The kitchen was actually quite neat and tidy for once, Brian was impressed. Then he looked up. 

“Are we really playing Pin the Baron to the Ceiling now, because I really would have liked to have the only other crew member competent in baking for cupcake night.”

“I promise that this time, I will not add any teeth!” The Toy Soldier shifted its arms, both held behind its back, very suspiciously.

Marius blinked rapidly at Brian in Morse code. He had gotten the S and O mixed up and was signalling O-S-O, pause, O-S-O, pause, O-S-O. 

“Is anyone going to help me get him down or do I have to do this myself?” Brian asked the rest of the room, putting his hands on his hips. He made sure to have eye contact with every single person. It was Dadbot Time.

Ashes started whistling and Tim suddenly became very fascinated with his nails. Jonny crossed his arms and looked smug, and Brian quickly deduced that the three of them were the ones to blame here. Nastya was absent, although he did notice a pile of neatly stacked dishes, all cleaned, next to the sink, with a little note saying “:3”. Proper courtesy only from the one descended from royalty, typical.

Ivy pokes her head out from behind Raphaella, expression neutral but her eyes betrayed a bright glimmer of curiosity. “Congratulations. Is there a nonzero chance I could join these philosophical discussions, I have had many thoughts and I would like to share, in addition to having an entire database on the topics of epistemology, ontology, realism...”

Brian yawns. It had been a long day. “Sure, Ivy, we’ll invite you next time.”

The Toy Soldier hops on the spot, excitedly. “We’d love to have you around for tea! The more the merrier!”

Whether it was what makes you up, what you experience, or what you feel that makes you real, at least it was a worthwhile experience. 

“Can we _please_ get started on the cupcakes now?” Marius asked, still stapled to the ceiling.

And also cupcakes are totally worth being real for.

**Author's Note:**

> Watch me try to write about philosophy but not be able to articulate thoughts correctly at 3 AM in the morning.
> 
> This is entirely to showcase my love for these two (and also because I came up with the title while listening to GTvsMK and was possessed for a couple days to write this), and also so I have an excuse to use my headcanon that TS doesn't know that Drumbot isn't his first name and they just call each other "Drumbot" and "Soldier", but y'know in a cute, affectionate kinda way.
> 
> (holds up Brian and TS) I just think they're neat! And deserve to be friends!
> 
> More stupid headcanons and things derived from conversations with my twin. Maybe I will write the Pin the Baron to the Ceiling fic.


End file.
